THE TANGLED BOY

In the resort town of Fairleigh Heights, teenager Cory Williams wakes up on the beach after a wild party he barely remembers. When the host, Jordan King, is found murdered, Cory decides to pretend he wasn’t there. Anonymous messages warning him to keep quiet only strengthen this resolve, especially since he’s already had enough problems hiding homosexual urges and a penchant for cross-dressing from his parents and schoolmates. Cory’s mother, Joyce, is stuck refereeing fights between her son and Russ, his two-fisted father, who can’t understand the boy and claims he doesn’t want to. And despite the rampant rumors and fumbling attempts at intimacy, Cory’s girlfriend Bethanne simply denies that there’s a problem. So Cory seeks solace and a sympathetic ear in Len, Joyce’s good friend—whose bitter ex-wife, Thelma, is another of her friends—unaware that Len harbors his own dark secret: He’s lusted after Cory since the boy was 12, though an annoying inner monologue frequently reminds him of his responsibilities as a father figure. Soon after Cory runs away from home, he and Len become lovers. Another teenager, bad boy Keith Tisdal, blackmails Cory into oral sex and winds up dead the next morning. But if two victims fall in a novel and nobody investigates, or much cares, is it still a mystery?

The superficial depiction of an affair between a 51-year-old man and a 17-year-old boy is only the most glaring of many flaws here. Trite characters, awkward dialogue, and titillation masquerading as frankness give this gay coming-of-age story from Canadian author Soles (The Abulon Dance, not reviewed, etc.) something to offend everyone.